You're Not Here
by Little Miss Wicked
Summary: What would the world be like if J.T. Yorke had never lived? And never died?
1. Chapter 1

_You're Not Here_

**Liberty Van Zandt walks across the campus of Smithdale. Her head is held high, her long curls look flawless, and her short skirt shows off her long, long legs. Every guy she walks past can't help but check her out. **

**And why shouldn't they? **

**She's young and pretty; they're young and handsome. It fits. Smithdale is a small school, but gossip never spreads fast, especially about Miss Van Zandt. Something she's very grateful for. It would be a shame if everyone knew about her past**

**About her dead boyfriend.**

**About how he died on her birthday.**

**About their kid.**

**About the fact that today is the 3-year anniversary of his death.**

**It's been 3 years and Liberty has tried her hardest to forget about Degrassi. Especially J.T., Emma, Manny, and Toby. **

**It was hard to forget about them at first. To ignore their phone calls, dinner invitations, all of it. But she stayed strong. She didn't cave or sacrifice her iron will for companionship. And sure enough, one by one, they stopped calling.**

**Manny first, the flaky one. The most self-absorbed of the group. Liberty figured she'd be first. They never were the greatest of friends. Manny had always saw Liberty as nothing more than an oddity. That peculiar girl who loved school and somehow managed to lure J.T. into her un-manicured claws.**

**Then Emma. She held on for longer than Liberty would have expected. Especially considering that pesky little incident with Damian. But everyone has their breaking point. Emma's had been Liberty's refusal to attend her wedding to Spinner the previous summer. It wasn't just her desire to break off al contact that had kept Liberty away; it was the sheer ridiculousness of their union. She and J.T. used to be considered a random couple. But compared to Emma and Spinner? Liberty can't recall them having ever had a single interaction all throughout high school.**

**Lastly, Toby. Her Toby. Her first true friend at Degrassi. He'd been there for it all, he'd seen her at her worst, and he'd held on till a few months prior. She remembered the end of their relationship perfectly.**

"_**Lib, please. You know I care. I've always cared. Sometime's a bit too much. But you aren't the only part of this." he begged. His glasses-clad face was screwed-up in anguish. **_

"_**Stop. This is what I want, Toby. I can't keep holding on to you. I need to move past it. I can barely say his name as it is and being around you and Manny and Emma makes it worse." Liberty breathed, her voice so icy it even scared her. "It's been almost 2 years. I thought that by now I'd understand it, even accept it. But every time I get close to that, everything starts to remind me."**_

"_**Please. You don't need to understand it. There's no way to do that. I wish that I could, too. I loved him just as much as you did. He was my best friend. Even when he was a jerk and even when he was with you and I was jealous beyond belief, I loved him. But pushing me away isn't going to make the world as it would've been if J.T. had never lived." Toby yelled, his eyes tearing. This wasn't the Liberty he knew.**_

"_**Good-bye, Toby. We had some good times, but I have to watch out for myself now, and you aren't conducive to that." Liberty stated, her tone flat and emotionless. This was what she wanted and no one would tell her other wise. Toby shook his head, before standing up and walking out of her dorm room. As he turned her doorknob, he looked back and muttered something under his breath. **_

**Liberty had tried to shake the memory of this from her head countless times, but she had failed. Just like she'd failed with the memories of J.T.'s mocking of her, the birth of their child and his death. They served as reminders of her past even when her old friends didn't.**

**That night, when she climbed into bed, Liberty did something she hadn't done in a while: reminisce.**

**She pulled out the one picture of herself that she liked. It was her, J.T., Emma, Manny, Toby, and a 13-year old Danny who had snuck into the shot. It was their first day of 9th**** grade. Liberty's heart beat sped up and ask she tucked the picture back into her drawer, she murmured one thing.**

"**I wish J.T. had never lived. Then I'd never have lost him."**

**A/N**

**-this is a chapter story**

**-Liberty is 20**

**- I know that this is different from the swarm of sappy EClare stories that are currently swarming the archive, but I just came up with this idea and decided to go with it.**

**-I like reviews, so make me smile**


	2. Chapter 2

_**You're Not Here**_

"Liberty." a voice calls out. Liberty sits up in bed, peeking at the clock. It's only 4 am. She can't have over slept, so that can't be one of her dorm neighbors waking her. But it didn't sound like any of them anyway. Nor would they care enough to wake her. The voice is so familiar. One that she's heard a million times before. One that she'll always remember.

"J.T.?" Liberty asks cautiously, sliding her glasses up the bridge of her nose. They're the same ones she had all through high school, the ones J.T. teased her mercilessly for. It's so strange that she can cut herself off from all her old friends, but still can't bare to throw out a simple piece of plastic and metal, wrapped around glass. Pathetic.

There's no reply. "Anyone? This isn't funny." she snaps, her eyes darting all over the room as she reaches for the light switch. _Please just let me be crazy_, she thinks before flicking the switch up with her index finger. The room is suddenly bathed in light, making Liberty's still-sleepy eyes hurt.

After scanning the room, even peeking under her bed, Liberty stands up and walks over to her dresser. She can barely look at herself, but she forces herself to. Sliding open the top drawer, she pulls out a small pill bottle. It's full of sleep-aids, prescribed for nightmares after J.T.'s death. They're almost 3 years old, but they'll still help. And she needs everything she can get.

_This is all your fault._

Giving herself one last, sad look, in the wall mirror, Liberty drops the pills back into the drawer and slams it fast, almost crushing her fingers. That would be just perfect: spending the night in a hospital waiting room on the anniversary of _his _death. Another fucked up chapter of her horribly tragic life.

_Why do I do this to myself?_

She sits back on the bed, not even bothering to turn off the light or pull up the covers. The headboard is hard, but she slowly drifts into a light sleep. Until…

"Hi, Liberty. Miss me?"

Then she screams. Because this time, her dead ex-boyfriend is sitting next to her.

"I thought you'd be happier. I mean, hello! I'm dead." J.T. mused dryly. Liberty pressed her hand over her mouth as her breathing got faster. This wasn't happening. This couldn't happen. It wasn't possible.

"You aren't real. This is a bad dream. I'm lonely and I'm stressed and some frat boy probably slipped something in my coffee in the café today." she panted. J.T. clicked his tongue in that annoying, grandma way of his.

"I'm real, Lib. Just…y'know, a ghost." he shrugged. "But this isn't a catch up visit. Those aren't allowed."

"Okay, fake, not possible, J.T. If this isn't a 'catch up visit', then why bother to see me now? It's been 3 years." Liberty spits, hating herself for enabling her own delusions. "What was so important that you just suddenly came back? Hm?"

"You. Lib, you wished I'd never lived. And that could happen." J.T. murmured softly. Liberty flash backed to her earlier statements.

"You can't honestly tell me this is all about a vain wish? I didn't even mean it." Liberty shoots back. But that's a lie. She did mean it.

And they both know it.

"I know, Lib." J.T. offers, humoring her because he knows that what comes next, comes no matter what. "But you said it. And once you say something, you can never take it back."

Review? I know this was short, but next one will be longer.


	3. Chapter 3

_**You're Not Here**_

"But you said it. And once you say something, you can never take it back."

Those are the last words Liberty hears. She starts to feel herself get dizzy. Very, very dizzy. And slowly, the feelings of dizziness are replaced by falling. Just before she's completely gone, one thought crosses her mind.

_What did J.T. get me into?_

"Hurry up, Libby! Do you want to be late to Media Immersion?"

The sound of Manny's annoying, sickly sweet, trying to hard to be sassy voice is the first thing Liberty hears. She quickly blinks her eyes, looking at her surroundings. Degrassi. The main hall. She looks up.

There's Manny.

Very young Manny.

She looks…innocent. As innocent as she ever was. But Liberty can tell that she's already trying to be grown up. The way she cocks her hip out, the thin layer of glitter shadow dusting her eyelids, the strip of tanned skin between her jeans and tank top; Liberty remembers the day she started dressing like this, in 8th grade. The beginning of the end.

"Lib? Are you okay?" It's a different voice now. Nicer, but…condescending. She knows just who it is.

Emma.

Who looks the same. Shorter, and less ragged. Pre-anorexia Emma. Her cheeks are much fuller than the hollowed ones Liberty has come to know over the past few years. And in the middle of looking over her old friends, Liberty come to realize something: _If they look like this, than what about me?_

"Liberty? You're scaring me." Emma laughs nervously, looking towards Manny skeptically. Liberty snaps back in to the conversation. She may not know where the hell she is or what's happening, but she does know that if she doesn't make an excuse quick, Emma and Manny are going to get suspicious.

"Oh, I'm fine. I just realized I left my note book back in my locker. I'm going to go get it. I'll meet up with you in class, alright?"

Manny nods and the two girls walk away. Liberty turns in the opposite direction and uses all of the restraint she has not to take off running. She walks down the hall at a brisk pace before slamming into the girl's bathroom down the hall. She runs to the sink and splashes water on her face, hoping it will end the nightmare.

"C'mon. C'mon. This isn't happening. J.T. is dead. Ghosts aren't real." she mumbles into the running water, bracing herself for what she'll see when she lifts her head. "You are not in 8th grade. You are in college."

Inhaling deeply, Liberty looks up.

Then her heart skips a beat.

And then, she screams.

And then, as if things couldn't get anymore fucked up, J.T. appears and slaps a hand over her mouth, muffling the screams.

"Shush. Shush. Lib, if you scream like that, people will think you're getting murdered back here." he jokingly chastises, removing his.

"Oh, no. I'm just seeing the ghost of my dead boyfriend." Liberty laughs dryly, still not understanding how things got oh so very weird so fast. "And my 8th grade self. Which is quite possibly more scary."

"Aw, Liberty, it's cute. You look adorable. Really." J.T. laughs.

Liberty glares at him and looks in the mirror again. Blocky glasses, frizzy hair in a high ponytail, puffy, awkward lips, and a striped frumpy T-shirt. Oh, and then there's also the fact that her nipples are showing through said T-shirt. Great. Did she really look like this? No wonder she had no friends.

"Lib, you didn't have friends because you were a know-it-all. And you did have friends."

Liberty looks away from the mirror and back to J.T. "How did you hear that?"

J.T. shrugs. "Uh, you said it. Just now. Out loud? This ringing any bells?"

Liberty rolls her eyes. Partially at J.T. and partially at herself. She turns back to the mirror, still not understanding what's happening.

"Do you believe that I'm real now or…?" he asks, hopping up to sit on the counter. If Liberty was sure of anything anymore, it was that she believed him. So she nods, regretting it mid head bob. But it's too late. "Good. Because you only get 24 hours to see the light about your wish and we're already behind. This is kind of a little pre-view before we get on to the main courses."

Liberty laughs nervously, scared of his 'been there, done that' tone. He seems a bit too sure of what's happening, which is nothing like the J.T. she knew. He was always vague and a little…detached from reality and responsibility. Except for when he was telling a joke; then he was always fully focused. Maybe he'd grown up.

No. she couldn't think that. He couldn't grow up. He died. She'd never get to know the mature, older J.T. because he'd forever be 17 for her. And that was why she'd made the wish.

"Lib? You still there?" he asks, tilting his head in concern. Liberty swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat and nodded again. "Right." he responded a little unsteadily. "Lib, you wished I'd never been born. Now, you're gonna see what the world would be like if I never existed. And you're not gonna like it."

Liberty scoffed. "I know what I want, J.T. I always have. And your life caused almost everyone we know pain. I caused the pain, too. And I won't change my decision just because you tell me to. You're just a hallucination or a projection of my grief. You're not real."

"Okay, Lib. You can think that. I won't argue with you. But I know things that will change your mind." J.T. answered sadly, biting his lip. "You'll just have to wait and see."

"What will I-" Liberty starts, but the dizziness comes back and soon enough, she's falling. All over again.

_Damn it, J.T._


End file.
